Elena Kryukova’s novel “Fair” is a tough, biting, vivid portrait of modern Russia. Maria Vasilyevna Stroganova, a former teacher, now a janitor. Her son Peter. Revolutionary Stepan Tatarin. Beggar artist Fyodor Mikhailov. Four living spears, on which the harsh fabric of the book tensely rests. The glamorous diva, the brazen and brilliant Aglaya Stadnyuk, nicknamed the Golden One, is a sharp and terrible contrast to the world of today's Russian outcasts. Aglaya and Maria still meet: the last beggar and the first rich woman collide at the railway station. School, court, market, clinic, Kremlin towers and courtyards; army, bank, police; a lying government with a governor at its head, a prison, gloomy winter houses, flooded with the golden honey of lanterns - here it is, a fresco of absolutely any city in Russia. But on this fresco there is a flying figure of a woman, Mary; her gesture, arms outstretched, is for hugging, for love. She did not lose it in the fire of hatred. Revolutions are doomed to repeat themselves. The gloss is sickening. The forgiveness of a loving heart is eternal.